It was delivered in typical State Department mush:
"We all fully recognize and respect freedom of the press and expression but it must be coupled with press responsibility. Inciting religious or ethnic hatreds in this manner is not acceptable."
No mention of the fact that freedom of the press is enshrined in our Constitution, which does not mention blasphemy. No criticism of those who wish violence upon those who published the cartoon.
Nah, bash those engaging in Western values of free speech while kowtowing to the fatwah types.
I'm glad we didn't have these guys around during WWII. They would have apologized for how we represented Germans and Japanese in popular culture:
"While freedom of speech allows someone to sing You're a sap, Mr. Jap, we also should not condone such ethnic characatures."
You're right, in some ways, of course. The language of diplomacy is pretty wishy-washy, overall. But there it is. Right now, we're balancing a lot of spinning plates on little sticks. Actually, we're always doing that.
That's why diplomacy is such a tough gig. Yes, it's all mushy, but that's what happens when you're negotiating with two different sides, I suppose.
Right now, the Muslims are all ticked off by these political cartoons. At the same time, we're trying to do lots of things that involve Muslims and Islamic governments to cooperate with us. So, we indicate that we don't support blasphemous depictions of Muhammed, while saying that we support freedom of the press.
Again, unless we're ready to flatten the whole middle east, what choice do we have? We have to negotiate here. If we're not working toward establishing democratic types of governments in Iraq and Afghanistan, then let's get the heck out of there and let these idiots blow themselves to smithereens.
It just isn't simple. It's never simple.